January 3, 2016 | LetsRun.com

The Fields For The 2016 US Olympic Marathon Trials Just Got Bigger

Jacksonville Half Marathon: 27 Men Go Under The 65:00 Trials Standard As Jonathan Grey Wins In 62:47 Over Fernando Cabada (63:25) And Chris Derrick (63:41) The top 14 women went under the 1:15 standard as Stephanie Dinius won in 1:13:27.
*MB: 27 sub 1:05 at Jax half
*43-Year-old Kevin Castlille Qualified With 1:04:33 Castille was our QOD earlier this week.

GB News

Good Read: Jessica Ennis-Hill: “Juggling everything and becoming a mum is the hardest thing I’ve done.” Ennis has joined the ranks of women who are trying and succeeding in competing as pros not long after giving birth.
2016 A Make-Or-Break Year For GB Sprinter James Dasaolu The 28-year-old became the second fastest Brit ever in 2013 with 9.91, but hasn’t broken 10 seconds since, had a terrible 2015 and is now only on “relay funding.”
Adam Gemili A “Name To Watch” In 2016 This year, Gemili broke 10 seconds for the first time this year when he ran 9.97, but then ruptured his hamstring a step after the finish line. Will he come back in 2016?

IAAF Personal Bests Q&A With US’s Shot Put World Indoor Champ Ryan Whiting One of Whiting’s throwing songs is “Duel of the Fates” from Star Wars.

Running Times Talks To A Coach, Strength Trainer And Biomechanist To See Which Strength Training Exercises Are Worth Your Time Most of them don’t come to a consensus so you can read their arguments and decide for yourself.

Nick Willis And Jordan Hasay Putting In The Miles For 2016

Nick Willis Training Harder Than Ever Ahead Of Rio 2016 Willis says he’s finally stayed healthy enough to do “a real man’s training as opposed to making the most of the talent I had without really being able to put in the real work.”
Jordan Hasay Running 100-Mile Weeks And Eating 5,000 Calories A Day Training For Rio 2016

2015’s End Means No $10,000 For A Sub-20 5k For Mike Rossi

More memes at: http://memegenerator.net/Mikerossicheat/images/new/alltime/page/5 LRC Viral Marathon Dad – And Suspected Marathon Cheat – Mike Rossi Fails To Claim First Part Of LetsRun.com $100,000 Challenge Which We Are Doubling To $200,000 Anyone who understands running knows there is no way Rossi ran 3:11:45 in 2014.

Unreal Viral Marathon Dad – Mike Rossi – Named PhillyMag.com’s #1 Biggest Losers Of The Year Ahead Of Bill Cosby Mike Rossi‘s 15 minutes of fame continue as he’s now officially infamous. Somehow he’s done the impossible, much like his 3:11:45, and been ranked even higher than Bill Cosby. At this point, it would have been better for him to have been DQed as then there would not have been the $100,000 challenge.
*MB: Did Mike Rossi (viral marathon dad) cheat his way into Boston?

2016 Is Here

Are You Ready For Some New Year’s Day Football? Meet The Top Track Athletes In College Bowl Games
Athletics Weekly’s Top Rankings For All Events In 2015: *Men and *Women On the women’s side for the distance events, they are exactly the same as LetsRun’s except for the women’s marathon. The men’s 800, steeple and marathon are different.
A Few British Athletes Share Their New Year’s Resolutions From vowing to use the foam roller to not eating crisps (chips), these were kind of boring to read.
2015 IAAF End-Of-Year Reviews – Sprints

Heart News

Dope Up: Scientific Study Shows That Statin Meds Won’t Hurt Your Running “We found no significant negative impact of statin therapy on 10K race or marathon performance [the statin users actually slowed less over 10K], and therefore no compelling evidence to forego statin therapy.”

U.S. Junior Teams Set For Great Edinburgh XC 2016

Sprint News

Andre De Grasse Joins ALTIS Sprint Group In Phoenix He’ll be in good hands with head coach Dan Pfaff, one of two coaches officially recognized as a genius by LetsRun.com (JK is the other).
Wife Of First Zimbabwe Sub-10 Sprinter, Artwell Mandaza, Dies And Tons Of People Show Up At Funeral He ran a windy 9.9 in the 1970s but never got Olympic glory as Rhodesia was banned from the Games. *Learn About Mandaza’s Interesting Career Here

Field Event News

Elite Distance News

Good Read: 43-Year-Old Kevin Castille Trying To Be Oldest Male Marathon Trials Qualifier At Jacksonville Half On Sunday Castille already ran 1:04:45 and got a USATF letter saying he qualified, but then without notice his name was taken off the list because the course wasn’t eligible.
Good Q&A: Extensive Interview With Syracuse Coach Chris Fox Fox talks at length about this year’s team and winning NCAAs, but also about wanting the team to be good for the next 10 years and his own career.
What Professional Runners Do In The Off-Season Hear from Nick Symmonds, Deena Kastor, Kyle Merber and more as to how their routine, diet and activity all change during their down time.

Time To Say Goodbye To 2015

Recommended Read: Daily Relay Does Comical “Yelp Reviews” For 2015 Their reviews for Usain Bolt, Genzebe Dibaba, Russia and others are spot on. For Nick Symmonds they say: “In dispute with the city over a zoning ordinance. Has yet to reopen. Will review again next year, hope it’s open when I go back.”
IAAF 2015 Mid-D Review: Asbel Kiprop Made His Competition Look Like A Joke As Genzebe Dibaba Made History
Athletics Weekly Does A Month-By-Month Recap Of 2015
BBTM: Month-By-Month, The Best Of the Mile In 2015 One of the biggest highlights came at the year’s end with the mile returning to NCAA outdoors.
Usain Bolt Wins His Fifth International Sports Press Association (AIPS) Athlete Of The Year Award He was voted the winner over Novak Djokovic (tennis) by sports journalists from 91 countries. The women’s award went to tennis star Serena Williams while Genzebe Dibaba and Dafne Schippers finished 2-3.
Jamaican Writer Calls Danielle Williams’ World 100H Gold The Best Of 2015
Strava Shares Their Best Photos From 2015
Athletics Illustrated Shares Their Top Articles/Interviews In 2015

From Tragedy To Triumph

LRC Feature The Miracle In The Black Hills: A Coach, A Fallen Teammate And A Season For The Ages In July, Black Hills State’s Gage McSpadden was struck by lightning and tragically killed at the age of 21. The team’s dream of a first-ever NCAA appearance, one that McSpadden had guaranteed, appeared to be shot. No one will ever forget how they responded.

RIP To A Local Legend

Recommended Tribute: WP: “Charlottesville Mourns A Moving Landmark, ‘Running Man’ After He Is Hit By An SUV” 55-year-old Philip Weber was a local legend in Charlottesville and known to most only as “Running Man.” He earned his fame from running miles and miles on the roads every day since the 1980s, always shirtless and in short shorts regardless of the weather.
NBC29 WVIR Video: Community Remembers Charlottesville’s ‘Running Man’
Great Profile/Video On “Running Man” From This November Weber lived a simple life and got by with not much money so he could spend more of his time running. He put thousands of miles on each pair of shoes, repairing them as he went with duct tape and Shoe Goo.
MB: Charlottesville Runners – Did you know ‘Running Man’? Killed by SUV?

2015 In Review

Blogger Mark Cullen Picks Emily Infeld And UW Alum Meron Simon As His 2015 Athletes Of The Year Do you remember what they both have in common? Read to find out.
Track And Field News Chooses Ashton Eaton’s And Genzebe Dibaba’s Decathlon And 1,500 WRs As Top Performances Of 2015
IAAF 2015 Diamond League Review – Part 1 Read the highlights from Doha through the adidas GP in NYC. *DL Review Part 2 Paris through Brussels.

2016 Has Begun

Mike Kigen Dominates San Silvestre Vallecana 10K In 27: 35 As Evan Jager Finishes Runner-Up (28:54) Ezekiel Kemboi was a non-factor as he finished 21st. Linet Masai won the women’s race in 31:38.
*MB: Jager vs Kemboi in road 10K for New Years
Ethiopia’s Tamirat Tola (28:28) Beats Out Muktar Edris (28:44) And Imane Merga (28:56) To Win Boclassic New Year’s Eve Race In Italy Steepler Jarius Birech and NZ’s Zane Robertson were 4th and 5th. World XC bronze medalist Netsanet Gudeta won the women’s 5K (15:57) over Janet Kisa (16:02) and World Champs 4th placer Viola Kibiwot (16:02). *Full Results
RRW: Daniel Winn And Sarah Pagano Win NYRR Midnight Run Winn beat out Louis Serafini and Joe Stilin while Pagano won over Katie Matthews with UK’s Lisa Dobriskey 5th.
*MB: So who won the midnight race in Central Park?
Kenya’s Vincent Kipruto (2:10:18) And Ethiopia’s Worknesh Edesa (2:24:04) Win Xiamen Marathon In China The men’s race came down to a final 200m kick with Kipruto beating out Ethiopia’s Shura Kitata by only 2 seconds.
Jan. 30th: Lolo Jones And Kristi Castlin Racing Over 60H At Camel City Elite Meet

More 2015 Highlights

Which American Runners Took Home the Most Prize Money In 2015? Molly Huddle was the top earner with more than $150,000 in prize money this year; Jared Ward was the top man at $105,166. The Americans are way behind the top international earners as Ethiopians Aselefech Mergia and Lelisa Desisa earned $307,000 and $275,000 respectively.
DyeStat Gives The Top 15 High School Highlights Of 2015
Sprinter Candace Hill tops the list with Grant Fisher‘s and Matthew Maton‘s 3:59.38 miles next.
IAAF Recap The Highlights From Each Of The 12 World Challenge Meets In 2015

2015 LRC Year-End Rankings

LRC Men’s Marathon: All Hail Eliud Kipchoge; Meb Keflezighi Leads Americans Who deserved the #1 US ranking took some thought as Ritz beat Meb in Boston and Luke Puskedra had the highest WMM finish of any American (5th) and fastest time of the year as well (2:10:24). Updated: We had to take Wilson Erupe off the list as we were reminded he’s an EPO cheat.

LRC Women’s Marathon: Mare Dibaba Is World #1 (Barely); Desi Linden Leads Americans Mare Dibaba broke 2:20 and won Worlds this year so she deserves to be #1, particularly when you factor in she was also 2nd in Boston. Speaking of Boston, there, Desi Linden ran the fastest time on the year for the US and placed the highest of any American in a major this year.

Previous: *M800 *W800 *M1,500 *W1,500 *MSteeple *WSteeple *M5k *W5k *M10 *W10k

News From Oregon

Former Eugene Resident And 1956 Olympic LJ Champ Elzbieta Krzesinska Has Died At Age 81 – Anyone In Eugene Know Her?
Univ. Of Oregon Wants To Double Oregon Hotel Tax From 1% To 2% To Raise $25 Million To Pay For Eugene 2021 And you guessed it – the tax won’t be reversed to 1% afterwards.
*MB: Eugene 2021 will spend $6 million on music festival, but only $7.2 million for prize money?
Eugene Register-Guard Columnist Urges Chip Kelly To Return To Oregon Many fans in the comment section don’t want him back as he, like Martin Smith, didn’t schmooze the locals.
*MB: See Ya Later Chip Kelly

Olympic News

Rio City Government Claims Barra Olympic Park Is 95 Per Cent Complete
IOC President Thomas Bach Says Olympic Agenda 2020 Reforms Are “More Urgent Than Ever” He says the Olympic movement must “change or be changed.”

Training Tips From The Top

Steve Magness: “The Value Of Moderate Training Days” Magness talks about the benefit of having “in-between days” that aren’t easy or hard.
Video Interview: Jordan Hasay Gives Training Tips For High Schoolers: “Steady, Long-Term Progress”
Top British Atheltes Give Their Tips For Success Some good advice from Tom Farrell, who says to be patient and enjoy the process.

Some Good Advice For The New Year

Recommended Read: Former NCAA Champ David McNeill Blogs About The Often Strained Relationships Between Runners And Non-Runners “For the friend, family member, or significant other who shares in a runner’s life, the all-encompassing impact of running can become a source of resentment, with the resentment going both ways.”
Good Read: Six Ways To Change Your Running For The Better In 2016 Some good advice from elites and coaches on how you can improve mileage, recovery, strength, diet and more.

Indoor Stuff

Kenya Will Be Choosing Their World Indoor Squad By Committee Rather Than Trials Might be hard to choose runners in January based on “current form.”
Roof Of Texas Tech Indoor Training Center Collapses Due To Heavy Snow Thankfully, no one was hurt and the building was actually scheduled to be torn down and replaced this spring.

LetsRun.com’s Look Back At 2015 *Year-End Rankings

Wejo A Look Back At 2015: Tsepo Mathibelle Is My Athlete Of Year, Evan Jager’s 8:00:45 Is My Race Of Year, Plus My Unknown Person Of Year And One Regret Wejo hands out high praise to two unknowns – one literally and one figurative. The anonymous source at the IAAF for Hajo Seppelt‘s work is is Person of the Year and Tsepo Mathibelle, who blew up at Worlds, is his Athlete of the Year.

Rojo: The Year Of Doping And Corruption, No One Is Too Big To Fall, Domination By Stars On The Men’s Side And New Faces On The Women’s Rojo is far from depressed by the doping/corruption scandals of 2015 as it shows no person is too big to fall. He has high praise for Hajo Seppelt and Vitaly and Yuliya Stepanov, looks at the domination by stars on the men’s side and new faces on the women’s side, plus the emergence of Eric Jenkins and Emily Sisson.

Gault Kipchoge’s 2:04:00 Without Insoles, Dibaba’s 3:50:07, Bolt > Gatlin, The Greatness Of Montaño, Symmonds, Farah And Cheserek What a year: Eliud Kipchoge ran 2:04:00 with his shoes falling apart, Genzebe Dibaba ran 3:50.07 with both her shoes, Bolt defeated Gatlin, and Montaño, Symmonds, Farah, and Cheserek kept winning.

News From Kenya

After Three “Disaster” Years, Abel Kirui Believes He Will Bounce Back In 2016 Kirui is still dreaming of not only making the Kenyan Olympic squad, but winning marathon gold to add to his 2012 silver. He’ll start 2016 with the Tokyo Marathon in February.
Athletics Kenya Will Select World Indoor Team In January
A Rundown Of Kenya’s Most Impressive Athletes In 2015 Jav thrower Julius Yego tops the list of thirteen.

The Action Will Heat Up Once 2016 Arrives

2016 Hakone Ekiden Preview – Aoyama Gakuin University Looking To Repeat In Biggest Race Of Year In Japan The race is January 2-3 and Ayoyama has 10 guys with 10,000 PRs under 29:00.
Sunday: 104 Elite Distance Runners Lining Up At The Jacksonville Half Marathon For One Last Ditch Effort To Qualify For The Marathon Trials The men’s field includes some top elites as well with Chris Derrick, Anthony Famiglietti and Tyler Pennel lead the way.
*MB: Chris Derrick running a half in Florida this weekend
Evan Jager, Ezekiel Kemboi And Linet Masai Lead Fields For Madrid’s San Silvestre Vallecana 10K Men’s field also has Turkey’s Kaan Kigen Ozbilen (formerly Mike Kigen of Kenya) and Masai will face 2:22:30 marathoner Birhane Dibaba.
41-Year-Old Mariko Kiplagat Kipchumba Has Chance To Win Sunday’s Xiamen Marathon – Mare Dibaba Not Defending Her Crown 2:05 man Vincent Kipruto is also in the field. Dibaba, our #1 ranked marathoner for 2015, ran 2:19:52 in Xiamen last year.
GB’s Lisa Dobriskey And Joe Stilin Lead Fields For The NYRR Midnight Run In Central Park

There Has Been Some Action This Week

Ritsumeikan University Wins Third-Straight Mt. Fuji Women’s Ekiden National Title They came up short for the “perfect win” of winning all stage titles and the overall win as they won 5 of 7.

Year In Review

Sean Ingle’s Favorite Track And Fied Moment Of 2015 Was Dafne Schippers’ Women’s 200m Win He also cited the US women’s 4 x 400 epic collapse as a contender.
As We Enter Olympic year, Which Are The Strongest – And Weakest – Track And Field Events In The UK? Jessica Ennis-Hill (heptathlon), Mo Farah (5,000m/10,000m) and Greg Rutherford (LJ) lead the way for the Brits as the men’s throwers were horrendous. They had their worst shot year since 1987, worst javelin year ever and their top discus guy is 50th in the world.

A Tribute To Mike Byrnes, By Elliott Denman Byrnes was one of the men behind the National Indoor Scholastics meet and he died at 84 on Dec. 26th.